Responsible Leadership
q&a series

With Brontie Ansell
Co-Creator of
Nature on the Board

Introducing Brontie Ansell,
named one of Vogue Business’
100 Innovators of 2024
for her work as a sustainability
thought leader, Brontie is the
managing director of
Lawyers for Nature.

[Q:] What’s a truth about leadership
you wish more people were brave enough to say out loud?

I think good leadership for where humanity is going means being willing to sit with discomfort, to make decisions that won’t pay off in the next quarter, and to be responsible to those beyond shareholders, meaning our communities, our ecosystems, and future generations of sentient beings who aren’t in the room being heard. This kind of leadership for me is quieter, slower, and far more demanding in the longer term than the heroic narratives we are often trained to look up to, but it’s the only kind that holds up under pressure. For me, I believe that responsible leadership is not about certainty, it’s about responsibility in the absence of it. Too many leaders perform confidence when what’s actually required is humility, listening, and the courage to say “I honestly don’t know yet, but I will work on this” rather than offer some sort of sticking plaster that we all know is a lie.

I’ve unlearned the idea that success is about scale, speed, or, even, visibility. For a long time, success has been framed in society as growth at all costs. In professional circles this means more clients, more reach, more recognition. My work has taught me that restraint, integrity, and saying no can be far more responsible overall and it brings with it a level of calmness that you cannot achieve when you are constantly chasing the next growth jump.

I have found that for me some of the most meaningful points of my working life don’t look impressive from the outside: walking away from work that compromises my values, slowing a process down so Nature or communities are genuinely heard, or quietly holding a line in a boardroom when it would be easier to stay silent. Success, for me now, is measured by service to others, including Nature and by alignment with those who wish to journey together for a while.

I think the existence of Lawyers for Nature is a meta example of this. Nearly all of my peer group still work in corporate law, they are mostly partners in law firms now. I genuinely hope they are happy and are paid well. However it was never for me. I started Lawyers for Nature because I knew I could not get up everyday and go to work in a commercialised law firm. For me there was not enough focus on doing the right thing in the wildest, largest sense of the phrase. Yes you must do what your regulator or client demands of you, but I saw time and time again that this did not necessarily mean doing ‘the right thing’ for the greater good of all life.

Of course, over the last 7 years there have been those micro moments where refusing to greenwash, oversimplify, or give people the answer they wanted has cost us work, momentum, and popularity. As a small specialist practice those decisions matter. But I’ve learnt that credibility is cumulative and, once lost, it takes so long to regain. Lawyers for Nature exists to shift power, not to polish it. Saying no to work that undermines the rights of nature or future generations is not a moral luxury for us; it’s the foundation of our legitimacy.

Oh yes, for sure and repeatedly! One of the clearest tensions has been between commercial growth and depth of impact. We could have scaled faster by simplifying our message or offering lighter-touch solutions. We could have commercialised our Nature on the Board work, for example, by starting some sort of licensing system where we were arbiters of who was doing it well (and who was doing it not so well!). We chose not to, we decided that replicating those old patterns of land grab and gate keeping were not in anyone’s best interest, let alone Nature. Instead we’ve chosen to do harder, slower work, such as policy influence, embedding Nature into governance, redesigning fiduciary concepts, and transforming decision-making structures so that it is no longer the case that Nature can be easily ignored by those holding power.

It’s hard to watch money flow into other’s pockets when you know you are more than capable of the work they are putting out into the world. But what it’s taught me is that leadership is about designing organisations you can stand behind with integrity now and in ten years’ time. The work only really matters if it changes how power is managed for all, not just when everyone is nice and it's convenient to acquiesce, but also when it’s inconvenient to do so.

One of the most entrenched beliefs I’ve had to challenge is that Nature is an “externality” and an object of law. Meaning it is something to be managed, offset, or priced, rather than a living system we are legally, ethically, and materially embedded within.

Challenging this inside corporate and legal systems has taught me that resistance often comes not from malice, but from fear. People fear complexity, accountability, and systemic change. I think that progress happens when you create workable structures, such as Nature on the Board, that make it easier for people to act differently without needing to become overnight heroes. Systems don’t change through rhetoric alone; they change through good governance.

What keeps me awake is the normalisation of harm of ecosystems and the story of ‘growth without consequences’. This normalisation filters through from the huge multinationals to the simplest gesture by a member of the public. Wholescale ecological destruction is treated as an acceptable side effect of economic activity, and we systematically exclude all but the most powerful human groups from decisions that will define all our futures.

At Lawyers for Nature, we envision a future where the value of Nature is recognised, given the respect it deserves, and provided with the legal protections it needs to flourish. Our aim is to reimagine and, ultimately, reshape our legal system to one that protects the inherent rights of the natural world. In doing so, we will contribute to climate rebalance and foster regenerative, ecocentric legal systems that serve all life.Our work is rooted at the forefront of this paradigm shift, where Nature is given legal rights and a voice in critical decision-making processes.

I would rewrite directors’ duties in the Companies Act 2006 so that responsibility to Nature and future generations is explicit, enforceable, and non-negotiable. It would not be something bolted on through ESG or voluntary commitments. It would not be something that directors have to simply ‘have due regard’ for. It would be a foundational duty that all businesses must interrogate from design ideas to waste management of end of life products. Whole ecosystems would be able to, via legal subjecthood, demand that they survive in our ‘growth at all costs’ phase.

That rule would serve those who currently have no seat at the table: ecosystems, keystone and marginalised species, communities on the frontline of environmental harm, and people not yet born. It would also serve directors themselves, by giving them clarity and courage to make decisions aligned with long-term planetary limits rather than short-term financial pressure.

I hope they say I stood for integrity when it was uncomfortable, and for Nature when it had no voice. I hope they say I helped move rights of nature from the margins into the rooms where decisions are actually made. More than anything, I hope they feel a sense of permission for themselves that leadership doesn’t have to be extractive, performative, or disconnected from life itself. That it’s possible to lead with care, courage, grace, and service to all life and still build something that lasts.

[ Brontie Ansell bio ]

[ Named one of Vogue Business’ 100 Innovators of 2024 for her work as a sustainability thought leader, Brontie is the managing director of Lawyers for Nature.

Initially focussing on public law and judicial review, she then moved into Rights of Nature work. She was a lead legal architect of the 2022 Faith in Nature, Nature on the Board intervention. Later, she became the first person to sit as the legal guardian for Nature on the board of Faith in Nature and she held this position for two years. Brontie now sits on a number of corporate and non-profit boards as both a non-executive expert and as 'Nature'. Brontie is the managing director of Lawyers for Nature.

Brontie works with the philosophy of Rights of Nature to bring change to systems, companies, and people. Her work is focussed on creating robust legal structures that allow Nature to be represented in human decision-making spaces. Brontie advocates from the position that Nature already has rights and the law must reflect this in order to be an equitable, democratic society. She is also working on theorising, and putting into practice, the concept of responsibility to future generations and the equitable sharing of all resources across the Earth. Brontie is keen to progress work that builds upon previous movements such as women's rights and children's rights, while stretching imaginations to a place that will enable a just transition for all. Brontie is also a public speaker on similar issues. ]

RESPONSIBLE LEADERSHIP

Do Epic Good's Responsible Leadership Q&A series spotlights voices who are leading with integrity, courage and impact. These are people like you. People who remind us that no matter what industry you are in, responsible leadership is the only way to lead.

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